Every life holds great drama, and a few big watershed events: education, marriage, a first home, children. Momentous events such as these do not come without expense, or risk (along with a hopefully much greater set of blessings and rewards!). You wouldn't sink your life's savings (and perhaps some of your parents'...) into your first home without insuring your investment, would you?

A wedding can be an equally large investment. Wedding insurance is a tool designed to protect your investment throughout the planning process, and the event itself. Not only are you investing money that you would want to recoup if something goes wrong, you are also, as the host of an event, assuming liability risks for the safety and wellbeing of your guests. I consider insurance so important, that I require all of my clients to purchase both wedding and travel insurance.

You can get liability insurance close to your wedding date, after you have confirmed your location and caterer. However, I recommend getting wedding insurance at the beginning of your planning process, before you start spending a lot of money. This keeps you covered in the event of cancellation and/or postponement, photographs, attire, gifts, rings, loss of deposits, and professional counseling. The cost of your insurance policy will depend on how much you are covering: in other words, how much would you lose if your wedding were cancelled? If any of your service providers are not insured, consider adding them to your policy.

Two of the largest companies offering wedding insurance are Wedsafe and R.V. Nuccio & Associates. As the number of destination weddings increases, and American couples spend more to realize their wedding dreams in increasingly exotic locations, hopefully insurance companies will keep pace by expanding their coverage.

Wedsafe

Phone: 1-877-723-3933

Wedsafe offers destination wedding insurance domestically, in England, Mexico and the Caribbean for an additional 10% over their usual fees.

R.V. Nuccio & Associates

Phone: 1-800-Engaged

R.V. Nuccio & Associates, which specializes in wedding insurance, does not offer destination wedding coverage outside the United States.